Scenario: SW Galactic Empire vs. WH:40K Imperium of Man

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-02-12 05:47pm

Gunhead wrote:So, it like breaks up targets at sub atomic level or something?

Something strange like that, yes. Note however, that this does not imply that it isn't DET.

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 05:49pm

Gunhead wrote:So, it like breaks up targets at sub atomic level or something?

-Gunhead

It's a thermal energy weapon, firing a beam/bolt depending on setting. The higher power settings are a bolt, and lower ones seem to be beam like.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 07:00pm

Hohum, maybe something in plasteel reflects most of the meltas beam but still enough is absorbed and it's enough to melt the armor. Thinking about that microwave analogy.
Maybe it's too far fetched. Have to think about it more.
That sub atomic agitation really bugs me.

What I was really hoping for is fluff/novel quotes about stuff thrown at the land raiders. Are there any? Would be nice since that's something already quantified by GW so it's a good benchmark.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 07:04pm

Gunhead wrote:What I was really hoping for is fluff/novel quotes about stuff thrown at the land raiders. Are there any? Would be nice since that's something already quantified by GW so it's a good benchmark.

-Gunhead

Land Raiders don't show up much.

However their armour's <2000mm of Titan grade plasteel, that much is for definite, so it's an upper limit at least.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 07:20pm

Urgh... 2000mm of plasteel....
Who ever made up that number obviously doesn't know that the land raiders measurements are:

Lenght: 10.36m
Width: 6.10m (without sponsons)
Height: 4.10m
Weight: 71t
Which still makes it fucking big for an AFV/APC.

Now tell me with a straight face that number isn't a tad silly.
Btw. Land raider armor is the high techiest of them all, it's made of four different layers.
Basic titan armour is made from two.

-Gunhead

Lost Soal · Post by **Lost Soal** » 2005-02-12 07:24pm

Gunhead wrote:Hohum, maybe something in plasteel reflects most of the meltas beam but still enough is absorbed and it's enough to melt the armor. Thinking about that microwave analogy.
Maybe it's too far fetched. Have to think about it more.
That sub atomic agitation really bugs me.

What I was really hoping for is fluff/novel quotes about stuff thrown at the land raiders. Are there any? Would be nice since that's something already quantified by GW so it's a good benchmark.

-Gunhead

It isn't the plasteel its self that does it. The IoM developed a type of thermal shielding which can be applied to the armour of some tanks. It was specifically designed to combat melta weapons.

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 07:28pm

Gunhead wrote:Urgh... 2000mm of plasteel....

It's the number given in Titan: Cold Steel for certain armour faces on a Warlord-class Battle Titan.

Who ever made up that number obviously doesn't know that the land raiders measurements are:

Lenght: 10.36m
Width: 6.10m (without sponsons)
Height: 4.10m
Weight: 71t
Which still makes it fucking big for an AFV/APC.

Now tell me with a straight face that number isn't a tad silly.

Answered above.

Btw. Land raider armor is the high techiest of them all, it's made of four different layers.
Basic titan armour is made from two.

-Gunhead

Titan primary armour is also composed of adamantium plating - IOW, starship grade armour, which is just a bit tougher than LR armour.

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2005-02-12 07:34pm

You know Gundhead, modern tanks don't have the beat all end all of armour technology on them, thus drawing analogies to modern tanks for something with 20k years more materials technology is a very poor idea. Instead, look at the general material properties of the armour. The thermal resistivity is enourmous. Land Raiders are used on nuclear battlefields and are expected to provide some protection (they are used around titans, and there are pictures of them with nuclear explosions in the background). They can survive some rather massive amounts of internal and external damage (a land raider can survive having plasma vented internally, though it has to be massively repaired). Landraiders survive KE hits that would gut modern tanks (wish I had some quotes but I think the titan comics had them surviving .75cal hypersonic rounds) and thermal damage that would destroy modern naval vessels (Multimeltas, Plasma weapons).
The number in the IA sourcebook is obviously flawed as it goes against every other piece of evidence of the Land Raiders toughness on canon record. Remember that most codex and sourcebooks are written somewhat in universe and contain missinformation and propaganda as well as factual data and game rules. It makes interpretation very hard.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 07:38pm

So, the warlord would be a battle titan Yes?
I think it was mentioned before but just to make sure. (Yeah I still doubt that 2000mm figure but I'll let it fly since it's not contradicted by other sources.)

Warhound titan armour is layered ceramite and adamantium.
Frontal armour being 120mm thick.
Rear armour is 60mm thick.

Land raider actually has better overall armour still, which is kinda funny actually.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 07:48pm

Gunhead wrote:So, the warlord would be a battle titan Yes?
I think it was mentioned before but just to make sure. (Yeah I still doubt that 2000mm figure but I'll let it fly since it's not contradicted by other sources.)

Yes. The primary armour is composed of "meters-thick adamantium armoured plates" (Crusade For Armageddon by Jonathan Green, page 47, paragaph 2, line 5).

Warhound titan armour is layered ceramite and adamantium.
Frontal armour being 120mm thick.
Rear armour is 60mm thick.

Land raider actually has better overall armour still, which is kinda funny actually.

-Gunhead

And yet Hekate considers Land Raiders "ants," and after destroying three immediately remarks that he requires "something more worthwhile to waste my ammunition on."

Hell, the shockwave from firing a Volcano Cannon buckles tank armour that's too close, and the Warhound Vitas Falco, which was standing right next to Dictatio's volcano cannon while said weapon was firing, didn't even budge.

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 08:01pm

Right, from Cold Steel:

150 mil gatling shells punch like white hot augers through two metre thick pasteel casings, puffing out blizzards of micro shrapnel.

And Hekate on the subject of Land Raiders:

"Ants. Moderati Voss, I require something more worthwhile to waste my ammunition on."

And just as a quick reference to Titan firepower, Tyranid bio-titans (probably only four or five, given how many Dictatio encounters) were able to, in very short order, reduce 20,000 square miles of jungle (jungle with trees taller than Battle Titans) to ash - along with the three million plus Imperial Guardsmen that the Titan unit had been dispatched to relieve, and their equipment.

This was done fast enough that nobody managed to get a vox message out to High Command.

Note: I haven't given page numbers here because neither Titan: GOd Machine or Titan: Cold Steel have them.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 08:12pm

Well Hellion it's always about what source you choose to believe in a debate like this. To me IA manuals read like tech manuals, without propaganda or misleading. They state the capabilities and the purpose of a vehicle. In fact some of the stuff in there would be heretical "in game".

Black Admiral has been a sporting fellow and provided me with quotes and refences from material I don't have access to, and I given him all the info I have from IA and RL I have.
All this without it degenerating into a shouting match.

Throwing around words like plasma and hypersonic don't impress me.
HEAT weapons in use today produce a jet that has a temperature of 6000-7000C, and they exert a pressure of 200t/ square inch against the armor.

So if theres propaganda in the IA, lets take into account the battle fatigue, and other psychological conditions our brave trooper is under, from whose vantage point the story is often told in the novels. Not to mention the propanga he's getting shoved down the throat by our friendly commissar.

My position is simple, I'm doing this because I want to know what the IoM is or isn't capable of.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 08:16pm

I'd prefer to go with Dan Abnett's work, since most of the time that things like ranges and armour resistance are stated, it's either in the narrative, or by people who know this sort of thing and aren't under major stress.

And mainly, he does use the Imperial Armour numbers (for tonnage, speed of air-breather fighter variants, armaments, etc.), just adds in some stuff.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 08:26pm

Who did those Titan books and was Hekate piloting warhound or some other titan?

That buckling tank armour is easily explained, some tanks use riveted armor. While the plate itself could take the blast, the rivets don't.

Riveted armor was noticed to be a bad idea in WWII, when it was discovered that M3 lee's rivets when struck by a rifle bullet break up inside the tank causing ricochets.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 08:35pm

Gunhead wrote:Who did those Titan books and was Hekate piloting warhound or some other titan?

Light Warlord. And the Titan series was written by Dan Abnett.

That buckling tank armour is easily explained, some tanks use riveted armor. While the plate itself could take the blast, the rivets don't.

Riveted armor was noticed to be a bad idea in WWII, when it was discovered that M3 lee's rivets when struck by a rifle bullet break up inside the tank causing ricochets.

-Gunhead

Thing is though, serious kinetic impacts haven't actually done that much damage to Guard armour before (like the Wrath of Pardua in Honour Guard). I'd say that most proper IG tank units don't use riveted armour (they already have stuff that I suspect isn't listed in IA, like auspexes, inertial dampeners, laser rangefinders, autoloaders, etc.)

Oh yes, there's reference in Double Eagle, on page 44 (Capt. LeGuin's mentioned as "throwing the autoloader lever.")

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 08:44pm

Well I really couldn't say how common riveted armor is. Mars Alpha pattern uses riveted armor that I can tell you. How common is said pattern...? beats me.

I know an instance. Tank Ace Weissmans driver was wounded by a flying piece of tank armor that was caused by a kinetic impact. And that was a Baneblade he was in. Remember what I said about those spall liners?

I never said IoM tanks couldn't have autoloaders in them, I just said they're not standard.
Just out of curiosity what kind of a tank LeGuin commands?

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 08:49pm

Gunhead wrote:Well I really couldn't say how common riveted armor is. Mars Alpha pattern uses riveted armor that I can tell you. How common is said pattern...? beats me.

Probably varies depending on where you go. The most common type of Leman Russ, at least in the Sabbat Worlds Crusade, is the Phatheon pattern model.

I know an instance. Tank Ace Weissmans driver was wounded by a flying piece of tank armor that was caused by a kinetic impact. And that was a Baneblade he was in. Remember what I said about those spall liners?

Some Guard units actually seem to use those (the Pardus tank units for certain, since there's no mention of shrapnel flying about inside their tanks, except from penetrating hits).

I never said IoM tanks couldn't have autoloaders in them, I just said they're not standard.
Just out of curiosity what kind of a tank LeGuin commands?

-Gunhead

Leman Russ Exterminator, used to command an LR/D.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-12 08:55pm

That Exterminator would make sense since it's armed with two autocannons so it would get the most out of an autoloader.
For some odd reason though it seems even those don't come with an autoloader as standard. They should, but then again, not all worlds have capability to make autoloaders so it's better to make a basic pattern that is manually loaded.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-12 08:57pm

Gunhead wrote:That Exterminator would make sense since it's armed with two autocannons so it would get the most out of an autoloader.
For some odd reason though it seems even those don't come with an autoloader as standard. They should, but then again, not all worlds have capability to make autoloaders so it's better to make a basic pattern that is manually loaded.

-Gunhead

Well, going by one of the short stories (Defixio by Ben Counter IIRC), the non-autoloader armed Exterminators tend to use higher-cal shells to get around that.

Currald · Post by **Currald** » 2005-02-12 09:33pm

Gunhead wrote:Something having a very thick armor is always relative to something in the universe it's in.

Is there some information you'd like? Perhaps quotations regarding thinner-armored vehicles?

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-13 06:40am

Measurements would be nice, the actual thickness of armor, projectile velocities, projectile weights and stuff like that.
Black Admiral already sort of said krak-missiles are HEAT munitions.

KV-1 had very thick armor in it's time. It still has if compared to a pzIII or the like. Compare it to a T-62 and it's armor isn't tough.

Point of inteterest. I checked the stats again. Turns out that 400mm of steel I've been using, is the effective thickness of the plate without taking into account sloping. This would make the frontal armour of the supers significantly more durable in real life since they have sloping front armor. Leman Russ and it's variants don't.

POI2. Titans would have an advantage against tanks, because of their height.
they effectively could shoot at the top armor of tanks, and even against their frontal armor they'd negate the effects of sloping.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-13 07:05am

Gunhead wrote:Measurements would be nice, the actual thickness of armor, projectile velocities, projectile weights and stuff like that.
Black Admiral already sort of said krak-missiles are HEAT munitions.

They pretty much have to be. No mention of blast for them for one thing, and when a HEAT warhead's explicitly referenced (Honour Guard) there's no surprise coming from the Guard infantry or officers.

POI2. Titans would have an advantage against tanks, because of their height.
they effectively could shoot at the top armor of tanks, and even against their frontal armor they'd negate the effects of sloping.

-Gunhead

It looks like Dictatio was shooting through both the front and rear armour of the LRs it destroyed, while crossing a ridge.

And I really don't think it'd matter, 2000mm of Titan-grade plasteel is beyond any Guard tank's frontal armour - or all of its armour facings combined, come to that.

Gunhead · Post by **Gunhead** » 2005-02-13 07:24am

That last bit was really about warhound titans, which I think is the most common titan around. Vanquisher is said to be able to penetrate the armor of a titan, I'm pretty sure they were talking about a warhound. Possibly of something 1 step bigger than that.

That being said, IG would still need IMO a 3 to 1 advantage in titan busting tanks to be able bring the sucker down.

This means at least 3 vanquishers or baneblades/shadowswords, against a warhound.

-Gunhead

Black Admiral · Post by **Black Admiral** » 2005-02-13 07:26am

Gunhead wrote:That last bit was really about warhound titans, which I think is the most common titan around. Vanquisher is said to be able to penetrate the armor of a titan, I'm pretty sure they were talking about a warhound. Possibly of something 1 step bigger than that.

That being said, IG would still need IMO a 3 to 1 advantage in titan busting tanks to be able bring the sucker down.

This means at least 3 vanquishers or baneblades/shadowswords, against a warhound.

-Gunhead

That sounds about in line with Storm Of Iron, where three Land Raiders managed to have a fair good at taking on a Warhound (granted, getting close enough that it could kick one wasn't a smart move).

Dark Hellion · Post by **Dark Hellion** » 2005-02-13 12:39pm

For the last fucking time Gunhead stop sticking to the 400mm like gospel. If it was 400mm we would see bolters and lasguns take down Leman Russes but we don't. The only weapons you see that can handily core a Russ are multi-GJ range lasers and Tau Railguns, which fire hypersonic slugs that leave a trail of plasma in the air following them. Tanks like the Shadowsword are considered reasonably survivable on a battlefied were kt level firepower thrown around like nothing given that they are Titan Killers.
And yes, GW themselves have said that most of the stories and fluff are written from an in universe perspective (it was in WD). They are legends, not totally objective field reports. Depending on who tells it, they are probably stretching the truth slightly. A guardsmen unit who took down a space marine was probably shitting itself at the time, but when they write it later they will leave out that detail and tell how they had the plasma gunners move forward while firing suppressing lasgun fire. A Space Marine on the other hand might not even mention it when he kills an IG leutenant. This being said, there is a level of consistancy across books and "in universe" authors about various things like a Bolters firepower, how tough a space Marine is, or how heavily armoured a Titan is. This is what you look at and calculate from. Sticking with one piece of info only is bad form unless thats the only info we have. Remember this is a universe that considers ignorance to be a desired trait, anything written like an in universe technical manuel with reflect that.